


Have Pity

by aeoleus



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Adultery, Alex is a goddamn idiot as usual, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, JOhn's really fuckin angry, The Reynolds Pamphlet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-08
Updated: 2016-10-08
Packaged: 2018-08-20 06:46:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8239819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aeoleus/pseuds/aeoleus
Summary: The night he releases the Reynolds Tweets, Alex stumbles into John's apartment, drunk as hell. But the only person as pissed at Alex as Eliza  is John, and he's not afraid to let him know that.





	

**Laf at 8:31 PM**  
Turn on the TV  
  
**John at 8:35 PM**  
I can't I'm trying to finish up this case work why  
  
**Laf at 8:36 PM**  
John seriously turn on the tv to CNN now  
  
**Alex at 8:47 PM**  
I fucked up I fucked up I fucked up please do not turn on the tv John I'm coming over DONT TURN ON THE TV 

* * *

 

John swung open the door and stared. Alex stood in the doorway. Or slumped, more accurately. He reeked of booze and smoke and the shadows under his eyes were dark enough to warrant bruising.  
"Alex," John managed. “What the hell did you do?”  
"M'fucked." Alex slurred. He stumbled forward and John caught him and dragged him to the couch, where he leaned back and groaned into the cushions. John could smell the nicotine radiating from his hands.  
"You smell like cigarettes." John said. Alex turned his head to the side and glared at John through swollen eyelids.  
"I'm in a fuckin' national crisis 'n all you can thin'bout is if I smoked?"  
"So you did. You smoked. Jesus, Alex! You told Eliza you gave that up years ago!"  
"That's not what she's gonna be angry about." Alex muttered. John leaned forward. His stomach was clenching.  
"What's she gonna be angry about? That it's-" he checked his phone. "- Three AM and you're at my apartment across town rather than, oh, I don't know, home with your wife and kids? And maybe it's that you're drunk as hell!"  
"No..."  
"Then what is it? What happened? What did you do, Alex?"  
  
Alex sat up slowly, rubbing his eyes. He took a deep breath and ran his hands through his hair.  
"I...I cheated." He said finally.  
John sat there. What?  
"You cheated? At what? Your citizenship test? Monopoly?"  
"No!" Alex's eyes were watering. "On Eliza. I cheated on my wife."  
Silence.  
John could feel something bubbling in his chest, threatening to explode.  
"You. Cheated. On your wife?"  
Alex nodded slowly.  
"Two years ago." He said hoarsely.

Two years ago. Two years ago. What happened two years ago?

Oh, fuck.

Two years ago, like when John was in London on "business" and Eliza had taken the kids to New York to see her family, and Alex had been alone in DC, struggling to pass a bill that was opposed by both the House and the Senate.  
"Alex." John said thinly. "Look at me. Look at me." Alex raised his bloodshot eyes and met John's.  
"You cheated on the woman who took you from suicidally manic to stable? Who supported you through everything? Who gave you a home and a family and unconditional love, not to mention six kids?"  
Through every word, Alex dug his hands deeper into his forehead, as if he was trying to push himself out.  
"I...yes. I did. I stopped it. But I did."  
“Jesus. Jesus fucking Christ.”

 

John got up and crossed his arms tightly over his chest.

“You’ve done some stupid shit in your time, Alexander Hamilton, but this has got to be the stupidest shit you’ve done yet.”

Alex nodded.

“Angelica said I’d invented a new kind of stupid.” He said miserably.

“You have!” John exploded. “You fucking cheated on Eliza Schuyler! She never had to put up with your workaholic ass and yet she did! Jesus! Don’t you know how lucky are?”

Alex flexed his fingers and bit his lip, hard.

“You think I don’t know that, John? I don’t deserve Eliza. I don’t deserve Philip, or Angelica, or James, or any of my kids. I don’t deserve Laf or Herc, or God forbid, Aaron Burr. Or you, I definitely don’t deserve you.”

 

John stared at him. Stared at the the hair escaping from the bun atop his head, at the scratches on his arm and the bruises under his big eyes. How long had it been since John had seen that look on his face, that look of total helplessness? Alex had had short hair. He was skinny then, almost a stick, but had a command voice that made his men snap to attention immediately. But he hadn’t been using it. Not when John was in Walter Reed Hospital with three bullet holes in his stomach and was refusing to eat, hoping to just quietly waste away. But Alex had refused to let him. Alex had camped in his room, had stared at John with those big eyes until he finally picked up a fork.

 

“What did you do, Alex?” John whispered.

“What did I do?”

“Laf told me to turn on the TV. You said not to. What the hell did you do, that it’s on CNN?”

“I, uh…” Alex looked uncomfortable. He got off the couch and paced to the other side of the room and back. He’d always been pacer. He stopped, finally, and looked at John.

 

“The bill I’m trying to pass now.”

“The bank plan.” John prompted.

“Yeah, that one. Jefferson and Madison were being utter assholes. They were looking through my financial disclosures. Found some stuff. They accused me of embezzling funds.”  

Alex looked so utterly offended that John would have laughed, if he could find any of this funny.

“What did you?” He asked.

“I,” Alex made a face. “I paid off her husband.”

“Whose husband?” John said slowly.

“Maria’s. The woman I, uh, slept with.” Alex winced as the words left his mouth.

“You paid hush money? And you thought no one would find out? Jesus, Alex. You’re the fucking Treasure Secretary.”

“Yeah. I know. I know. Believe me, I know. So, I had to do something before Jefferson tried to ruin my name.”

“What?”

Alex sighed deeply, then took his phone out. He tapped on the screen for a couple seconds, then handed it to John with a grim, determined look. It was Alex’s Twitter page, with his bio that pissed off every Republican from here to California, and his picture of himself and Eliza.

“What is this? I don’t-” John scrolled down the page. Three hundred new tweets. All from Alex. All within the same two hours.

“The charge against me,” John read slowly. “Is a connection with James Reynolds, for purposes of embezzlement. My real crime is an affair with his wife, for a considerable time, with his knowledge.”

 

Silence. Alex was anxiously running his hands through his hair. John looked up.

“You tweeted about it.” He stated levelly.

“Yes.”

“Alexander Hamilton, you’re the biggest damn idiot I’ve met in my entire life.”

“So I’ve been told.” Alex quipped weakly.

“Sit the fuck down.”

Alex sat immediately on the edge of the couch, bouncing his legs.

“Did Eliza know?”

“About the affair? No.”

“Before the tweets, though, you told her?”

“Uh. No.”

“No?”

“No. I didn’t tell her. I didn’t tell her anything.” Alex said. John tossed the phone aside and strode over to the couch, where he hauled Alex up by his shirt.

“Your wife. She’s months pregnant again. You didn’t think to tell her before you told the ENTIRE WORLD?”

“I didn’t think about it, John! I just wrote. I just wrote and wrote and that was it! I didn’t have time to think!”

The words left Alex’s mouth so fast it took John a second to decipher them. He tightened his grip on Alex’s shirt. Alex was barely standing, shorter than John by several inches.

“Yeah, Alex, you didn’t think! That’s the problem! The problem is you talked to me before your wife! You talked to Angelica before your wife! You talked to the entire world, before your wife!”

“I know.” Alex said miserably. “I know. Just punch me and get it over with, John.”

“What?”

 

John looked down. He was holding Alex nearly off the ground. He let go and turned away. He took a few deep breaths, and turned back around. Alex was sitting on the ground, head in his hands.

 

“Okay. Okay, here’s what we’re gonna do. Tonight, you’re gonna stay here. I’m going to text Eliza and tell her where you are, because God knows she doesn’t want to talk to you. Tomorrow, when you’re no longer drunk and full of bad decision making skills, you’re gonna delete all of those tweets, you’re gonna go home, and you’re gonna talk to your wife. Me and Laf are taking the kids out. You get it?”

 

“Yeah. Yeah. I get it.”

 

“Good.”

 

John offered Alex a hand, and pulled him to his feet.

 

“I’m not ever going to do anything like this ever again, John. I promise.”

  
“For Eliza’s sake, and really, for your sake, I hope you don’t.”


End file.
